I wanted to recommend to your players this Alice Indrao. It's from Brother Frank Salamone's sister. She yesterday sent a very generous donation for our building fund that was the first received of that kind. So we should remember her as mother of a family with all the various worries and still sparing something to give it to the monks. My attention was called to the fact that the telephone bill again is tremendously high this month. I wanted to ask people to be very careful in calling, especially long distance calls.

[01:01]

Even if it's calling in places like this, it always sums up in no time. So let us always think twice before using the telephone for a long distance call. Sometimes it can be avoided also by various people coordinating their wishes and pooling their things to one call. That may be otherwise two or three in the year. our little considerations concerning the contemplative life that we have taken up. Again, I wanted to do a little step further. I see that seems that good weather keeps some people away from hearing the word .

[02:05]

If we follow the idea of the contemplative life, literally, various activities of the monk, we have done that before, in the Divine Office, a Lectio, that spiritual part of it, and then especially also the kind of work, those two things we should, I hope we can discuss in these coming weeks. the spiritual part of our life and the manual work, all the things that are necessary to keep a monastic community going. Now, as far as the first part goes, that is, as you know, governed by St.

[03:18]

Benedict's principle, whence concordat voci, And in that word, the mind may be in harmony with, in concordance with the word. There you have immediately one of those sentences in which the meaning of contemplation, if you understand it as the squaring, so to speak, of two templar, of two... sacred precincts, the heavenly and the earthly one, can clearly be seen. That word has been understood in various ways. Just the other day I read a Franciscan version of it in which it was said that the Benedictines understand by that that the

[04:33]

the rhyme should be in harmony with the song, word, you know, so that the melody would be a kind of important thing in the whole business, and that this word led to the emphasis on Gregorian chant, it can be as the system. Well, Franciscans, thanks, guys, that we've regarded a deeper understanding of it. No, no, sir. Thanks. But there are others, for example, Robert Butler, you know, who speaks about this principle in the sense of a constant attention being paid to the word of the Psalms that we say or sing in public prayer.

[05:36]

That's actual attention and actual understanding. That seems to me is a little... now is a little limited in the interpretation. I think if one pays attention to the two words that are put there into correspondence, mens and vox, and if one... looks into their meaning level, then one can see immediately that Saint Benedict didn't have that in mind alone. This actual attention to the word maybe even was not the primary in his intention. I don't say that because I know that all people have the greatest difficulty just in that, you know, the minds be in harmony with the words at the moment in which it is spoken.

[06:44]

So often we find ourselves in as once, I'll never forget that, we were clerics in . He was for . He compared the vigils always with the, one of his outstanding experiences was the retreat he was in the army, in the German army, the First World War. and the retreats of the German army, and they were lying all over in these trains and some hanging in these nets where you put your luggage. I mean, that's in German. cars, you know, pre-war, you know, pre-World War, World War. And then they were lying up there, these nets, and then comes a, during the, by the train, rattles along from one station to the other, one sleeps, but then suddenly, with a sudden stop,

[07:53]

stops at a station, everybody wakes up and comes to himself again. So he considered the singing or saying of the recitation of the Psalms as the rattling along of that train, its effect on the attention, and then the versicle with the certain stop, then one wakes up, and then the reading as the moment of attention. and then again goes up to the next nocturne, to the next station, the train rattling along. That is a great difficulty because also the Latin language, as you know, is a great difficulty and barrier to just this, that mens concordat voci, easy. If you're speaking, you're easier, altogether easy, but easier if you have your native tongue.

[08:59]

But if you have to recite in Latin and then try at the same time, or you try to pronounce the words, also to translate them into your own language is really a difficulty. But it isn't only for that reason that I warn against, let us say, too narrow an interpretation of this principle of what men's concordat voci. But it's really true that St. Benedict understands the Latin language or Christian language of the Fathers, understands by men's not only that which is actually attentive But the mind is a much larger realm. It is really the whole, one can say, interior man. That part of man, the summa pars animae, the caput animae, the head of the soul, as the fathers also called the men's minds, the head of the soul, that part of our inner

[10:17]

spiritual man that is turned habitually I want to say by nature towards God that means the habit of faith the new grace the mind of Christ that we have received through baptism and that is in us habitually and we have to conform this inner man, this mind, to the works. The mind is that, we're going to say, the spiritual part of the soul. is that organ or that place with which, or the organ, the spiritual organ with which we receive especially the Word of God. Even one can say, I think rightly,

[11:21]

that part in which we receive or which becomes active in the celebration of the sacraments, of the mysteria, the divine mysteries. Mysteries mente congruer. That's a beautiful principle that the sacramentarium, the sacramentary, what we call the Leoniano, as expressed. We have something. We have in our present mass, we have such a word, a sentence, which is really of leonine origin. That's the priest in connection with receiving Holy Communion. What we touch with our mouth.

[12:23]

That we grasp that with our mind. That our mind should be in harmony with the mysteries. And you must pay attention there to what we call the habit character of mind. We also speak of mind and use the word, I think in English too, more of a constant mental attitude. Sometimes even mens in Latin, as well as in English, is the same as character, a constant attitude. not only passing the act of understanding, but something deeper, something habitual.

[13:27]

And that is what I wanted to emphasize. When you understand or hear this word or think about it, that our mind should be in harmony with the word. Don't take that only and focus only on the actual recitation of the divine offering. And then be unhappy if you realize that your mind is not always actually in harmony with your world. It's something deeper. The mind in harmony with the world is that your whole inner attitude, your mental attitude, should be formed not only by the passing word of the psalm, but should be worn by the whole world of what we call the Mysteria Divina, the divine mysteries. Mysteries mente congrue, with one's mind to be in harmony with, one can say, the liturgy.

[14:35]

That is what we call liturgical piety, meant in men's concorded voce, And there you can also see that right away, that there is really the only, to my mind, only possible meaning of contemplation. Contemplation is not only, say, the actual touching, the moment in which our mind, let us say, touches the divine presence, but it is a deeper, habitual thing. goes into the very roots of being. Contemplative life is, first of all, a being and goes into the depth of our habitual attitude. And therefore, sometimes it's the strange thing that today we find the, say, contemplative life

[15:42]

defined without reference to the divine mysteries, to that whole sacramental world which Christ has left to his church as his bride. Let his church do this in memory of me, that the church should do that in order to make him and keep him present in herself habitually. But for us, that is the meaning of that word, mens concordat voci, anything that contributes and that builds up in us the deeper, not only, I would say, understanding, that is more an intellectual thing, but the inner ontological conformity of our being to the Mysteria Ecclesia, to the mysteries which the church celebrates.

[16:48]

That should be understood in these words, that mens concordat voci. Then that also shows to you and encourages you Because you see right away that is not a matter from one day to the other. But that's a matter of months and of years, in fact of a life. That our mind, our inner man should be in its very being reach a greater and greater conformity to the Mysteria Divina. That's really the scope, the meaning, and purpose of the monastic life if it is lived according to the rule of Saint Benedict. Therefore, in our opinion, Every contemplative, there is no such thing, let us say, that a contemplative who is not thinking, as we put it today, on liturgical lines, so to speak.

[17:59]

But of course, when we say liturgical lines, we have to understand that too, not in a superficial way, but in a deeper theological way, in the way of the Mysteria Divina. Christ's redemptive mysteries. That's the feelings of all brethren. They are such a beautiful thing to combine the two, babe. growth of nature and the prayer of the children of God, and to go through the fields and sprinkle the holy water. Sometimes I have the feeling that the parking space gets a little too much.

[19:00]

It makes one a little embarrassed, you know, but maybe it needs it too. And then one realizes how closely and how deeply the two are connected to life, the monastic life, the monastic life, the way in which we understand it, and the work, especially the work on the phone. We know that growth is essentially a blessing. Man cannot by himself add one inch to his stature. It means he cannot interfere with his own will with the mystery of growth, but that is given to God. Paul may plant and Apollo may regale.

[20:06]

What is that? What place? but God has to give growth, as St. Paul says. And therefore, the best thing we can do, and after having done what is in ourselves, to prepare the soil, to open it up, so that God's blessing may we enter into it and after planning it and doing all these things that man I mean in his effort towards culture and the farmer certainly is the agricola the one who call it agro, the one who cultivates the land.

[21:12]

And cholera, of course, has always that connotation, as cultura has, of worship. Those two belong together. Man can prepare, can do some, his own little steps, as we always say, but then the rest The fruits and all that will become of it in the course of this coming summer, that is not in our hands. That is completely in the hands of God. And that is so good that here is an undertaking, here is a human work, which is really culture in that sense of man and God working together man preparing from below and God blessing from above and therefore the work that is being done here also in the fields on the farm is so deeply in harmony and so apt to

[22:27]

plant into the souls that spirit on which the whole monastic life essentially stands. It's different from any kind of what we could call industry, because in industry it is the cleverness of man that wants to get, let's say, a maximum of security with a minimum of risk. Therefore, with a minimum, let us say, of, now it's putting it a little harsh, interference from above. But that is a dangerous undertaking. We can see that probably in the years to come, doesn't know, sees that Those things have their reverse side. There where man tries to build his security completely on his own, maybe the risks are even greater, but from sides and aspects that he has never suspected.

[23:38]

So that industry, while in one way as a way to increase fast without much risk, so to speak. On the other hand, it may also decrease fast. Factors may intervene. which come out of the instability, the unpredictability of man, and suddenly interfere with kinds of work which are merely dependent then on the wills of man. What man is able to build up fast, he may also and is also able to tear down very quickly. And one thing that we need in our days is taking roots, but taking roots in just the nature that God has founded and cooperating with those laws that God has put into nature, the laws of growth, the laws of life that are independent of man.

[25:04]

We can kill life, but we cannot through our artifacts produce life. That remains, for that matter, a mystery. And man is only able to hand on life, but not able to produce life. And so in front of life, in front of the mystery of spring, which is growth in everything, in front of that man really stands there only as the lieutenant of god not on his own name but in god's name sent by him that's the mission of the messiahs that is the mission of the curious and a little community like ours wandering through these fields and the ground that God in his mercy and providence has entrusted to us seeing and rejoicing also in the work that has been done and looking and admiring also the human wisdom that certainly is evident in any work of true cultura

[26:28]

Still we feel that we are doing something which only prepares, prepares the opportunity for somebody infinitely greater who then comes and gives his blessing in his own inscrutable providential place. And there with that we can only cooperate in prayer. But for that matter too, prayer is omnipotence on its knees. And that is the only way in which we share in that great mystery of divine life, as long as we are pilgrims here on earth and are to work in the sweat of our brows and with the means that God has given into our hands.

[27:28]

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